Spotted, Blanding’s, and Wood turtle ​ ​conservation symposium

PACE Lab head Michael Dreslik and herpetologist Jason Ross presented at the 2019 Spotted, Blanding’s, and Wood turtle conservation symposium held in West Virginia this November.

http://www.americanturtles.org/2019symposium.html

Population Viability Analysis and the Role of Head-starting for a northern Illinois Blanding’s Turtle Population

Rapid Demographic Assessments for Freshwater Turtles: Filling in Data Deficiencies

White Cedar project presented at Great Lakes Coastal Wetlands Symposium

Sara Johnson, of the Molano-Flores lab at the Illinois Natural History Survey, presented a poster and lightning talk about Illinois Tollway funded research on the Effects of Soluble Salt on the Germination of Thuja occidentalis at the Great Lakes Coastal Wetlands Symposium in Maumee Bay, Ohio last week. This conference was the first symposium hosted by Audubon Great Lakes in partnership with the Great Lakes Coastal Assembly and Great Lakes Commission. Sara is a student representative for the North Central Chapter of the Society of Wetland Scientists and acts as Treasurer for the Student Chapter of the society at UIUC.

PaCE Lab at the Illinois State Fair

Smokey Bear using snake tongs

Members of the PaCE Lab exhibited in Conservation World at the 2019 Illinois State Fair, providing information and education to over 500 visitors. In addition to displays about the research being done by the group, visitors were able to try their hand at using actual field equipment used by scientists in their daily work.

The Illinois Bat Conservation Program had a mist net deployed where visitors could untangle, identify, and measure bats, all while wearing leather gloves.

The Amphibian and Reptile Conservation group had snake tongs, hooks, calipers, and radio telemetry equipment available for visitors to try to wrangle snakes into a snake bag, measure turtles, or track a hidden turtle.

Other activities included Build-a-Bug, where people can assemble the arthropod of their dreams (or nightmares) from a variety of general and specialized appendages, Wheel of Migration, about the risks migratory birds face, and locating PIT-tagged animals.

Smokey Bear using snake tongs
Gray Treefrog picked the right tent to visit
Wheel of Migration
Build a Bug
Vin Vasive wrangling a snake with a hook
Build-a-Bug

PaCE Lab at Biology of the Pit-Vipers

PaCE Lab Members and affiliates presented four posters at the third Biology of the Pit-Vipers conference held in Rodeo New Mexico – July 11 – 14 2019.

Baker, S. J., E. J. Kessler, E. Haynes, A. N. Schnelle, and M. C. Allender. Disentangling the effects of season and temperature on hematological values in Prairie Rattlesnakes (Crotalus viridis).

 

Dreslik, M. J., J. A. Crawford, and S. J. Baker. Assessing abundance of a cryptic viper using N-Mixture models.

 

 

Jesper, A. C. B., and M. J. Dreslik. Timing and temperature cues of spring emergence for the Timber Rattlesnake (Crotalus horridus) in Illinois.

 

 

 

Merchant, M., and S. Baker. Innate immune activity in the Prairie Rattlesnake (Crotalus viridis).

9 days, 3 conferences, 8 talks, 2 posters

It’s been a busy week of sharing science for members of the PACE lab.

The Chicago Wilderness Wildlife Committee Meeting was held at Lincoln Park Zoo on February 19th:

 

Tara Hohoff presented “The status of Illinois bats five years after confirmation of white-nose syndrome,” using data from her work with the Illinois Bat Conservation Program and the Urban Biotic Assessment Program monitoring for the Illinois Tollway.

 

Joshua Sherwood presented “Assessing the distribution and habitat of Iowa Darters (Etheostoma exile) in Illinois,” with co-authors Andrew Stites, Jeremy Tiemann, and Michael Dreslik. This work changed the way people look for the Iowa Darter.

 

Jason Robinson presented “Patterns of abundance and co-occurrence of bumblebees associated with the Rusty Patched bumblebee.” RPBB is a federally protected species found in northeastern Illinois that has experienced a decline in its range.

 

Jason Ross presented “Demographic influence of head-starting on a Blanding’s Turtle (Emydoidea blandingii) population in DuPage County, Illinois,” with co-author Michael Dreslik, discussing what amount of head-starting is needed to keep this population viable

 

The  2019 Wild Things Conference was held in Rosemont on February 23rd:

Tara Hohoff, representing the Illinois Bat Conservation Program, presented a poster “Year Three of the Illinois Bat Conservation Program.”

Anastasia Rahlin co-presented “Secretive Marsh Birds in the Big City.” with Audubon collaborator Stephanie Beilke on their ongoing work using playback to detect 17 focal wetland bird species in northeast Illinois and southeast Indiana. Soras were the most commonly detected species which was surprising/unexpected since Marsh Wrens and Swamp Sparrows are expected to be more common, and Little Blue Herons and Yellow-headed Blackbirds were the least detected which was pretty expected due to their declines. Future directions include creating species-specific occupancy models to better understand how our focal species respond to urbanization and presence of different wetland types at three different spatial scales.

Josh Sherwood presented “Current status of Bigeye Chub (Hybopsis amblops) in Illinois”.

Sarah Douglass presented “A preliminary analysis of mussel population dynamics in the Kishwaukee River.”

Jeremy Tiemann presented “Pulling the plug – Results of the fish and mussel salvage following the removal of the Danville Dam on the Vermilion River.”

Andy Stites presented a poster “Fecundity estimates of the Gravel Chub Erimystax x-punctatus

Snakes, fish, turtles, birds, and clams – PACE Lab at Midwest Fish and Wildlife conference

The PACE Lab was well represented at this week’s Midwest  Fish and Wildlife conference in Cleveland Ohio.  Lab members and affiliates from the INHS Herp Lab and the INHS Mollusc Lab presented 7 talks, 1 lightning talk, and 1 poster on a variety of fauna including: Massasaugas, Banded Killifish, Asian Clams, Alligator Snapping Turtles, Bigeye Chub, and Rails.

Presentations

  • Tracking recovery goals for the conservation reliant Eastern Massasauga rattlesnake. M. Redmer, M.J. Dreslik, and E.T. Hileman

  • Monitoring Eastern Massasauga populations within the Carlyle Lake region. M.J. Dreslik, J.A. Crawford, S.J. Baker, and C.A. Phillips

 

 

  • Combating threats to the Eastern Massasauga with directed conservation actions in Illinois. C.A. Phillips, S.J. Baker, and M.J. Dreslik
  • The epidemiology of Snake Fungal Disease in Eastern Massasaugas over the last 10 years. M.C. Allender, E. Haynes, M. Kelley, and S.J. Baker

 

  • Rapid expansion of Banded Killifish (Fundulus diaphanous) across northern Illinois: dramatic recovery or invasive species? J.S. Tiemann, P.W. Willink, T.A. Widloe, V.J. Santucci Jr., D. Makauskas, S D. Hertel, J. T. Lamer, and J.L. Sherwood

 

  • Testing the role of stream flow eDNA abundance using the invasive Asian clam Corbicula spp. M.A. Davis, J.S. Tiemann, S.A. Douglass, and E.R. Larson

Ethan Kessler presenting

  • Can we use environmental DNA to detect Alligator Snapping Turtles (Macrochelys temminckii) at the edge of their range? E J. Kessler, K.T. Ash, S.N. Barratt, E.R. Larson, and M.A. Davis

 

 

Lightning Talks

  • Using environmental DNA to determine Rail occupancy and track migration. A.A. Rahlin, M.A. Davis, and M.L. Niemiller

Posters

  • Recovery of Bigeye Chub (Hybopsis amblops) populations in Illinois. J.L. Sherwood, A J. Stites, J.S. Tiemann, and M.J. Dreslik

Strong showing from INHS PACE Lab at TSA

The #INHSPACELAB was well represented at the 2018 Turtle Survival Alliance Meetings in Fort Worth Texas, with 6 oral presentations and 3 posters.

Oral Presentations

Baker, S. J., E. J. Kessler, and M. E. Merchant. Antibacterial activities of plasma from the Common (Chelydra serpentina) and Alligator Snapping Turtle (Macrochelys temminckii).

Dreslik, M. J., E. J. Kessler, J. L. Carr, D. B. Ligon, and S. Ballard. Mortality is too damn high: challenges of Alligator Snapping Turtle (Macrochelys temminckii) translocations.

Edmonds, D., R. Nyboer, and M. J. Dreslik. Population dynamics of the Ornate Box Turtle (Terrapene ornata) at two sites in Illinois.

Kessler, E. J., K. T. Ash, S. N. Barratt, E. R. Larson, and M. A. Davis. Assessing the efficacy of environmental DNA to detect Alligator Snapping Turtles (Macrochelys temminckii) at the edge of their range.

Merchant, M. E., E. J. Kessler, and S. J. Baker. Differences in innate immune mechanisms in Common and Alligator Snapping Turtles.

Ross, J. P., D. Thompson, and M. J. Dreslik. Demographic influence of head-starting on a Blanding’s Turtle (Emydoidea blandingii) population in DuPage County, Illinois.

Poster Presentation

Dreslik, M. J., E. J. Kessler, J. L. Carr, D. B. Ligon, and S. Ballard. Post-release growth rates of translocated Alligator Snapping Turtles (Macrochelys temminckii).

Edmonds, D., A. R. Kuhns, and M. J. Dreslik. Growth in a central Illinois Eastern Box Turtle (Terrapene carolina carolina) population.

Feng, C. Y., D. Mauger, J. P. Ross, and M. J. Dreslik. A demographic matrix-model analysis of Spotted Turtles (Clemmys guttata) in Illinois.

 

Midwest Fish and Wildlife Meeting

UBAP herpetologist Sarah Baker co-organized a symposium “Advances and Challenges in Amphibian and Reptile Conservation and Management” and presented “Impact of Snake Fungal Disease on Population Viability” at the 78th Midwest Fish and Wildlife Conference in Milwaukee, WI. Jan 28-31.

Student Kelsey Low presented a poster on “Ranavirus Effects on Body Condition and Growth of Developing Amphibians in Created Wetlands”

UBAP staff presents at Ecological Society of America

UBAP Ornithologist Anastasia Rahlin presented a poster at the Ecological Society of America conference held in Portland, Oregon from August 6th-11th. The poster reported on the environmental DNA research being conducted in collaboration with Mark Davis and Matthew Niemiller to collect presence-absence data on cryptic rails in Northern Illinois. The project is testing environmental DNA for bird detection and comparing it to traditional playback surveys.

Rahlin, A.A., M.A. Niemiller, and M.A. Davis. Using environmental DNA sampling methods to determine cryptic wetland bird occupancy in Illinois.

 

View poster